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Top Girls
Mar 29, 2019 20:29:13 GMT
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Post by winonaforever on Mar 29, 2019 20:29:13 GMT
Churchill leaves me cold. Was never going to see this. She is one of those playwrights whose work i avoid. Life is too short. This sounds like another winner from Norris.
Cloud 9 is a terrific play (IMO) which makes its points and is quite funny in doing so. But then I also enjoyed Top Girls when I saw it in a very good production at the Trafalgar Studios a few years ago.
I love Cloud Nine! |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 30, 2019 9:11:09 GMT
It's a dreadful play, I don't know why it's regarded as a classic. It might have had something to say in the 80s but it's just a bad period piece now. Churchill leaves me cold. Was never going to see this. She is one of those playwrights whose work i avoid. Life is too short. This sounds like another winner from Norris. The closest I've come to having a panic attack in a theatre was five mins into Drunk Enough To Say I Love You, when I realised there was no realistic way of getting out. |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 30, 2019 10:54:09 GMT
Oh I can't wait. I loved 'Girls on Top' and it'll be nice to see French and Saunders back together. Wonder how much they'll pay Tracey Ullman and Ruby Wax to come back to the stage? And who is going to replace the late great Joan Greenwood?
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Post by zahidf on Mar 30, 2019 12:43:33 GMT
This looks like another 'get credit for my tickets' situation.
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Post by foxa on Mar 30, 2019 20:45:47 GMT
Oh no - what a shame. I saw the original production at the Royal Court and loved it. The cast was amazing including Selina Cadell, Lindsay Duncan, Deborah Findlay, Lesley Manville and Gwen Taylor (Taylor was SUPERB.) It was well-directed, highly theatrical, changing styles deftly and felt surprising and relevant. Also liked the production at the Trafalgar a few years back. But I think it is a bit of a delicate piece - I saw a production in NYC shortly with some good actors (shortly after the Royal Court production) and it fell entirely flat.
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Top Girls
Mar 30, 2019 20:48:22 GMT
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Post by Snciole on Mar 30, 2019 20:48:22 GMT
The whole thing is baffling, Lyndsey Turner is a baffling director alright. I think Norris saw a quick win in terms of getting wimmins in theatre but I don't understand, from the sounds of it, why this production has been in a way that just doesn't work. Regardless of quality. |
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Post by foxa on Mar 30, 2019 20:53:44 GMT
I thought it was a lazy bit of scheduling - it has been frequently revived - I like Churchill, but I've seen three professional productions of this and lots of students doing excerpts.
It would be more interesting either to commission something new from an exciting writer or unearth something that has been neglected.
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Post by oxfordsimon on Mar 30, 2019 21:11:38 GMT
Churchill has certainly been over-represented during the Norris regime
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Post by Deleted on Mar 30, 2019 22:20:45 GMT
Oooh. I am living for this thread (as the kids say) because all the “cool kids” and whining academics of theatre won’t have a word said against our Caryl when the truth is she’s bloody hard work some days.
I do think she has moments of insight and genius, and I actually don’t mind Top Girls, but this sounds like a car crash. Poor Amanda Lawrence maybe she should flounce in with the Angel wings to liven it up a bit...
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Post by david on Mar 30, 2019 23:09:17 GMT
Having watched this tonight, all I can say is and this is being polite, it’s a total mess in my opinion. Act 1 just went on and on and on and on. I honestly thought that after the crazy dinner party opening finished that was it for Act 1 and then to my horror more was to follow. By the end of Act 1 I had actually lost the will to live and was seriously contemplating bailing out at the interval, though I decided to play it out and see where this mess was going. Though sat in the Circle tonight, there where quite a few patrons around me who decided wisely it seems to have made the decision to wave the white flag and not come back.
The beginning of Act 2 was actually promising with the two sisters and was actually interesting to watch and just as things started going the play ends just like that. I actually thought maybe there was more to come. Wrong. Lights up and the cast take their bows. Absolutely no proper conclusion to this play. It was like someone had wrote something but had no ending sorted out.
I try to find something positive to say about even the worst theatre stuff, but I’m actually at a loss to find anything nice to say. This is definitely NOT recommended as a watch (only if you want to watch a mess). I can’t even bring myself to give it 1*.
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Post by Fleance on Mar 31, 2019 2:09:44 GMT
Well I'm glad I asked. You all helped me save an afternoon for something better.
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Post by showgirl on Mar 31, 2019 6:04:03 GMT
Oh no - what a shame. I saw the original production at the Royal Court and loved it. The cast was amazing including Selina Cadell, Lindsay Duncan, Deborah Findlay, Lesley Manville and Gwen Taylor (Taylor was SUPERB.) It was well-directed, highly theatrical, changing styles deftly and felt surprising and relevant. Also liked the production at the Trafalgar a few years back. But I think it is a bit of a delicate piece - I saw a production in NYC shortly with some good actors (shortly after the Royal Court production) and it fell entirely flat. I too saw the original production and loved it, but it was so long ago that I can remember nothing more. I'm sure you're right about how it's done being critical but maybe also its time has come and gone? It certainly no longer appeals to me in the least but then that's true of everything by Caryl Churchill - and I had continued to try, but will give up now, based on the last attempt. |
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Post by MrsCondomine on Apr 1, 2019 7:35:51 GMT
Thank the theatre gods for this forum - just swapped my tickets for credit. Sounds painful.
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Post by dave72 on Apr 1, 2019 23:06:13 GMT
For what it's worth: I'm amazed at the general tenor of this thread. I'm an American who has loved and taught theater for over 40 years, and I don't know anyone who doesn't love Caryl Churchill. I have taught and directed her plays, and have seen every production of her work that I've had the opportunity to see. She's so prolific that of course some of her plays are stronger than others--she's a fearless and passionate experimenter who has changed the British theater more than anyone else now living. Top Girls is one of the masterworks of 20th c. drama. I haven't seen the NT production yet--I'm bringing a group of 24 Americans to see it (along with 9 other plays) in June--and I'm more than slightly worried about the decision to undo Churchill's doubling, which seems to me integral to the play. So I may or may not love this production. But to say that the play itself is incoherent or nonsensical is to sell one of the great works of British theater very short indeed.
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Post by showgirl on Apr 2, 2019 3:45:49 GMT
I appreciate that you are making a serious point, dave72, and there's room for all shades of opinions here, but to be rather more frivolous, it sounds as though the NT will be glad of your business! |
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Post by thetheatebug on Apr 2, 2019 20:19:25 GMT
At the interval. Completely baffled and bewildered. First experience of top girls and haven’t a clue what’s going on. That first act was so tedious and so long. If anyone sees this - is the second act only going to be 40 minutes or should I go and have a pint?
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Post by Deleted on Apr 2, 2019 20:36:19 GMT
At the interval. Completely baffled and bewildered. First experience of top girls and haven’t a clue what’s going on. That first act was so tedious and so long. If anyone sees this - is the second act only going to be 40 minutes or should I go and have a pint? If you're asking yourself if you should have a pint, it's always a sign that you should have a pint. |
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Post by david on Apr 2, 2019 20:53:54 GMT
At the interval. Completely baffled and bewildered. First experience of top girls and haven’t a clue what’s going on. That first act was so tedious and so long. If anyone sees this - is the second act only going to be 40 minutes or should I go and have a pint? Drinking is the better option believe me. |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 3, 2019 6:12:21 GMT
I know I've seen this play before but couldn't tell you what it was about. I do however seem to recall Suranne Jones wafting about in shoulder pads at a desk. After that I'm stumped I'm afraid.
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Top Girls
Apr 3, 2019 16:45:26 GMT
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Post by vickster51 on Apr 3, 2019 16:45:26 GMT
So......it’s press night tonight. I’m curious to see if the reviews will agree with most of us, or see something I certainly didn’t!
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Top Girls
Apr 3, 2019 23:17:28 GMT
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Post by nash16 on Apr 3, 2019 23:17:28 GMT
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Post by dave72 on Apr 3, 2019 23:49:54 GMT
It is "dazzlingly perceptive", so everyone here is wrong. 😂 Not everyone. And what makes you think Aleks Sierz is dishonest? One of the best critics around, IMHO. |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 4, 2019 5:58:59 GMT
Your arts council subsidy at work ...
The Times review (from what I can see of the paywalled article) gives it two stars and calls it an "at times stilted revival of Caryl Churchill's famed play"
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Post by Deleted on Apr 4, 2019 8:17:32 GMT
There's... I'm not quite sure how to put this, but you seem worryingly unaware that people can have different opinions of a thing without one of the people automatically being "wrong"? |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 4, 2019 8:24:01 GMT
Without seeing the play myself but with knowledge of it, the only thing I take issue with is the 'no need for doubling' because to my mind the doubling is intrinsic to the production of Top Girls. THAT SAID what's the point in revivals if we don't shake it up?
As much as his book was a bane of a few weeks of my life as well, Sierz is one of the best we've got writing on theatre, so I take his opinions as 'informed' even if I don't always agree which is sorta the point no?
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